Friday, 23 October 2015

Jan van Ruysbroeck Seven Steps in the Ladder of Spiritual Love

Night Office 
Monastic Lectionary of the Divine Office,
Jan_Van_Ruysbroeck
We behold that which we are,
and we are that which we behold.

The Blessed John of Ruysbroeck (1293 or 1294 – 2 December 1381), "the Admirable" also known as John RuusbroecJan van Ruusbroec or Jan van Ruysbroeck, was one of the Flemish mystics of the medieval Catholic Church.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ruysbroeck  


TWENTY-NINTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME
FRIDAY 23rd. October 2015


First Reading
Jeremiah 22:10-30
          Responsory       Lam 2:1
How the Lord in his anger has brought darkness on the daughter
of Zion! + From heaven to earth he has cast down the honour of Israel.
V. On the day of his anger he has remembered his footstool no
more. + From heaven ...

Second Reading
From The Seven Steps in the Ladder of Spiritual Love by Jan van Ruysbroeck

The first fruit which springs from good will is voluntary poverty. Those who are poor of their own will live free and without care for all earthly goods that are not needful. For like a wise merchant, they have traded earth for heaven, and followed the saying of the Lord, that one cannot serve God and the kingdom of the world. They have left all that can be possessed with earthly love, and purchased voluntary poverty. This is the field in which they have found the kingdom of God; for blessed are the poor in spirit: theirs is the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of God is love and charity, and the practice of all good works; whence comes it that those who are thus poor in spirit are generous, pitiful, kind, mild, truthful and honest toward all who are in need of them, so that they may bear witness before the tribunal of God that with the bounty bestowed on them by God, they wrought works of mercy. For among earthly things they have nothing of their own, but all that they have is common to God and to his household.

Blessed are the poor in spirit, who possess nothing transi­tory; for they have followed Christ. They shall be rewarded in virtues a hundredfold, and shall look forward to the glory of God and life everlasting.

But rash and foolish are the covetous, for they give heaven for earth, which earth they know that they must shortly lose. The poor in spirit scale the skies; the covetous are plunged into hell; and when the camel shall pass through the needle's eye, then shall the covetous enter into heaven. And even though they live poor in earthly things, if they choose not God before all and die in their avarice, doubtless they shall perish.

The covetous prefer the husk to the kernel, the shell to the yolk. Those who cleave to gold and love earthly goods eat poison that brings death, and drink the water of eternal sorrow. The more they drink, the more they thirst; the more they own, the more they long for. Though they have much, they are not satisfied; they want everything they see that is another's; and all they have seems to them as nothing. Scarce anyone loves them, for the covetous deserve no love. They are much like the devil's claws; for what they grasp they cannot let go, and they guard what they have won by fraud until they die. Then indeed they lose all and straightway the pangs of hell take hold on them; for they are the image of hell which is not sated by what it seizes, and though it possesses many, is none the better. All that it seizes it holds fast and yet ever gapes for its hellish guests.

Wherefore beware of avarice, which is the root of all sin and evil.  

Responsory       1 Tm 6:9-10.8
People who long to be rich fall into temptations and snares, and many senseless and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction. + The love of money is the root of all evil.
V. As long as we have food and clothing, let us rest content. + The love of ...


 COMMENT:
Encountered the SEVEN Steps of Ladder Spiritual raised my eyes to the passing association, The TEN Mystic Ladder. 
No surprise then to the Link:    http://www.ccel.org/ccel/john_cross/dark_night.viii.xix.html?highlight=seven,steps#fnf_viii.xix-p1.1   
Saint John of the Cross
10 steps 0f the mystic ladder of Divine  love
CHAPTER XIX

Begins to explain the ten steps231 of the mystic ladder of Divine love, according to Saint Bernard and Saint Thomas. The first five are here treated.

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